Listening log Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Listening log - Essay Example With Stairway to Heaven, the lyrics are highly symbolic, so much so that it is possible that a great deal of the listeners really had no idea what all was being expressed. However, the music was so beautifully emotive that the lyrics came across on some level, making this song iconic in music history. Title: Hotel California Album: Hotel California Artist: The Eagles Year of Release: 1976 Rock Style: Hard Rock Musical Characteristics: This piece of music is also a hard rock ballad, but it is less sentimental and more dangerously exciting. There was a fascination with Satanism and the occult in the 1970s that came through in the lyrics. The lyrics tell a more straight forward story in which death and the afterlife is explored. The music is intoxicating, the beat seeming to be in 2/4 time, rather than the more common 4/4.The lyrics are the center of this ballad, as the story is highlighted by the use of the lead guitar. Comparison The two ballads are similar in that they slow down the overall play list of each individual artist in order to become more sentimentally expressive. The vocalists are at the center of the songs, even though the music is designed to echo the emotional renditions of the work. Both songs have similar themes of life and death. However, they are different in that they explore different kinds of sentiment.